The Exquisite Pleasure of Crossing a Bridge
by The Cheery Windmill
Summary: The Kolima Bridgekeeper has been unceremoniously treeified. A group of teenagers is off saving the world, and he's piece of foliage. Funny world.


Jarp the Bridgekeeper had always wanted to put down some roots and settle a bit, but he hadn't thought putting down roots would literally mean being turned into a tree.

Jarp, once a Bridgekeeper, was now a man-sized bigleaf maple. He had funny branches where his arms once were, a scrunched-up patch of bark where his face was, and a tangled mop of leaves where his retreating hairline had sat. Surely not so grand as the pines spearing up on the other side of the river, but still, it was important to be confident in one's own bark.

Jarp's drawbridge, a platform of six heavy logs fastened together, stood in its upright position beside the Bridgekeeper's cabin, allowing no passage across the river, and it would be stuck in that manner forever, presumably, because Jarp the Bridgekeeper, as he had been loping toward the lever to lower it last week, had suddenly and unceremoniously been transmogrified into a bit of foliage. Life was funny like that. Now the river below cut and slapped at the shore, unimpeded, undefeated—uncrossable.

Two days ago, four young adventurers (questing heroes, by their looks) had stopped on the farther bank.

"Hello!" one had called. "Are you guys trees too, or can someone lower the bridge?"

_Certainly! _Jarp longed to have called back. _Welcome to Kolima Bridge, young ones! I'll have it down in a jiffy! It's an exquisite pleasure, you know, crossing a bridge!_

But Jarp, the man-sized bigleaf maple, had only been able to let his leaves quiver on the breeze, watching them discuss their next course of action amongst themselves when no answer came.

Staring up at his drawbridge now... all he wanted to do was clunk across its springy surface once again, and allow those questing heroes to do the same. He had failed in his duty, and that was the worst part of being a tree.

"Well, don't fret about it too much!" the young adventurer had yelled, and he flashed his sword to the sky. "We'll end this curse on you and the rest of Kolima, don't worry!"

Then they had marched back the way they had come.

Awfully inconsiderate, this curse business. Some ill-advised Koliman logger had probably tried to chop down the Holy Tree in the deep forest. It had probably awakened, understandably angry at this incursion, and turned all the townsfolk into bigleaf maples to give them a taste of their own medicine. And Jarp, of course, had been caught up by association. What had he ever done to the Holy Tree, anyway? He was only happy to raise and lower his bridge, which, of course, was an exquisite pleasure to cross.

Jarp would have sighed, if he could have. True, he was the Bridgekeeper, and not a rampaging logger. But the drawbridge and cabin were made of logs. His hometown, Kolima, was a village of lumberjacks. Their houses were even hollowed out from stumps of felled sequoias.

He had used wood all his life. Now he was wood.

Life was funny like that.

A red squirrel tumbled across one of his two exposed roots (which looked suspiciously like a foot), scratched her way up his trunk, and dived into the messy patch of leaves on his head. Strangely, the rustle of her tiny paws was soothing.

Daisies waved cheerful hellos in the breeze. Sunlight dappled on the river currents, rippling and splashing, as tireless salmon threw golden spray from their leaps and dives. The moisture soaking into Jarp's roots felt somehow deeper and more fulfilling than drinking a glass of water, as a man, ever had.

There was a lot of time to think if one was a tree.

POP!

Jarp gasped and fell to his knees. The squirrel shrieked, leaped out of his hair, and dashed off into the green. He sucked in long breaths, panting, shook his head in bewilderment, rested a hand on the drawbridge, and blinked a few times.

"I'm a man again."

Jarp the Bridgekeeper stood up and stared at his hands, curling his fingers experimentally. He wasn't hungry after being a tree for a week. Wasn't tired. Didn't feel sick.

The curse was ended. He was a man once more.

Huh.

But he hadn't done anything. One second he was a tree, and the next he wasn't. Goodness, what a fickle world. Strange to feel so small and powerless. Four teenagers had saved the village while he stood treeishly, and waited.

Thinking about his bridge.

What was the point of all that?

Jarp touched his forehead.

Well, good thing he hadn't let those adventurers cross, or they wouldn't have been forced to go back and sort things out with the Holy Tree. If he hadn't been treeified along with the rest, they might have quested across the river and left Kolima a forest.

This curse business was still awfully inconsiderate.

He humphed.

Well, anyway, it _was_ an exquisite pleasure to cross this bridge.

Jarp grinned and tugged the lever he'd been longing to pull since last week. Those young adventurers would require passage. The drawbridge—six logs fastened together, six old tired trees—went clunking down...


End file.
